Stella 2T Carburator Cleaning

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Thu Feb 16, 2012 6:15 pm

My 2005 2T seems to have a carburetor issue.
It starts, I rev it up to keep it running, but it just dies out.
It takes several tries to finally get it running and idling.

I found a YouTube video that talked about two jets inside
the carb itself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyEau3pN5wk

Now I am wondering if there are other items inside that should be cleaned?
I saw mention in the maintenance manual about 'reeds' ... anyone know
anything about those?

Thanks fellas!!

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Thu Feb 16, 2012 6:24 pm

Also, any suggestions on re-adjusting the carburetor mixing screw located at the rear of the unit? The maint manual gave a procedure; Just wondering what you folks might suggest. My plug seems to foul about about 150 miles or so. I keep a few new ones in the front compartment.

roasteroo · Post by **roasteroo** » Sat Feb 18, 2012 12:44 pm

http://www.scootercentral.net/forums/vi ... 14&t=11177

See if this helps.

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Mon Feb 20, 2012 9:33 pm

Thank You !
Nice pictures, and great procedure. It's funny how this carburetor looks a bit different than the one I have. I wonder how many different Stella 2T carbs they make?
This past Saturday I drove down to my local scooter dealer 'GoScootOver' and asked their tech about that rear screw. He told me that was the Air-to-Fuel mixing valve and not the Oil-to-Fuel mixing valve. We looked up the information in his service manual. There it said to close the screw all the way then open it up 1-1/2 turns for starters.
When I got home I check mine by first closing and counting the turns. Mine was almost 5! I closed it all the way, then opened it up 2 turns for good measure. I then started road tested it. Also drove to work this morning (12 miles) and it ran really good!
I will now check my gas mileage on Wed, and check the new plug to see if it's fouled. I was changing it quite often. I believe the screw slowly worked its way out from vibration. We'll see what happens.
Thank you again for that great site!

lmyers · Post by **lmyers** » Fri Feb 24, 2012 7:33 pm

It wouldn't hurt to get a carb kit and just rebuild it while you're in the vicinity. And change your gear oil... those are the first things I do when I buy a used scooter that's actually running.
http://www.scootermercato.com/Scooter-P ... 154754-KIT

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Thu Mar 01, 2012 7:57 pm

Well, turns out that the air/fuel screw had backed itself out 5 turns!
I put it back to 2 turns and now everything is back to normal. No more oil drips and my mileage went from around 50MPG to 70 MPG.
I do change gear oil regularly. I get it from my local scooter store.
Thank you for your comments... all well taken!!

Lokky · Post by **Lokky** » Thu Mar 01, 2012 9:18 pm

lorenajack wrote:back to normal. No more oil drips and my mileage went from around 50MPG to 70 MPG.=!

Was this causing 2stroke oil or gear oil to leak?

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Mon Mar 05, 2012 5:19 pm

Hi Lokky !!

After I readjusted the air/fuel mixture from 5 turns to 2 turns I not longer leak any oil, nor is the engine covered with oil. I suspect the over-rich mixture was injecting WAY too much gas/2T into the carb causing some of it to simply leak out from (somewhere).

A friend of mine who was born and raised in Vietnam said they ride these kids of scooters all over the place. He told me to warm up the scooter then close the air/fuel mixture screw until the engine starts to run rough. Then he said to OPEN the screw 1/2 half turn. That should be the ideal setting.
I know this is more information than you were asking for, but I just wanted to share what I just recently learned from someone who rode one of these for many many years!

After the adjustment, my plug seems to 'foul' around 235 miles. Is this typical for a 2T Stella? I keep a few cleaned plugs in the compartment along with one new one. When it fails, it will start OK, but dies in a few seconds. I then put in a new/cleaned plug and I am back to normal.

If anyone else has other ideas I would love to hear them! Thank you!!

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Fri Mar 09, 2012 6:37 pm

One more thing.... I had a plug go bad AGAIN. Put one in that I cleaned and it still died out on me. So I pulled the plug out, made the gap smaller (less than the 7mm minimum) and reinstalled it. Now I am good again.
However, last night on way home I saw the 2T oil dripping again. I am going to use engine cleaner on the motor this weekend then run it to try to find out where the 2T is leaking from. It seems to run OK, just this drip again!!!

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Tue Mar 20, 2012 8:34 pm

This past weekend I pulled off the entire carburetor, carb box, and reed asm. I found the screws loose on the carb and on the reed asm. I replaced all the gaskets that I purchased earlier in the week. This is definitely where the 2T oil was leaking from. I now have no more leaks, but for some reason I cannot keep the engine running when I stop at a traffic light. I have to rev it up to keep it running. May be now a matter of playing around with the air/fuel mixture screw. I pulled the plug again to see if it was fouled, and it looked as good as when I first installed it yesterday.
Wonder if gas quality has anything to do with it?

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Mon Mar 26, 2012 5:16 pm

On Sunday Mar 25my grandson and I removed the carburetor and reed asm again because I noticed that T2 was once again leaking from below the seals below the carb and under the reed assembly. The two bolt-type screws that removes the carb were not tight! So we completely removed the carb and reed assembly, cleaned everything up with brake cleaner, including the gaskets. We then took the original old gasket below the reed assembly and using Permatex, we combined both gaskets. We also added Permatex to both sides of the doubled gasket and ALSO on the gasket between the carb box and the top of the reed asm. Used a BLUE thread lockers on the two screws on the reed asm and also on the two bolt-type screws that hold the carb to the carb box.
Hopefully, we have now stopped the T2 oil leakage (hopefully).
Finally we put a compression gauge on the cylinder where the spark plug fits, and measured about 120. The manual said it should be 140, so we were close.
I now need to ride this scooter a couple of days to get the idle to settle in. It did stop running in idle after the engine warmed up on Monday morning (at the first stop light) and subsequent stops. The rear Air/Fuel screw is turned out 3 turns.
I will let you know how things progress this week. (ooofff!....what a learning experience).

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Thu Mar 29, 2012 7:20 pm

I believe I have now solved my problem. To recap:

1. Started out a couple of months ago where 2T oil was leaking. Scooter would
just die out on idle, so in the scheme of things I kept changing out plugs which
seemed to help. But then I was concerned about the 2T leak.

2. Purchased gaskets for both the carb and the reed plate. I replaced those and
things were OK for a day or two. Oil started leaking again, and the scooter kept
stalling after only a couple of miles.

3. I pulled everything apart again and added some Permatex to the gaskets. Also
noticed the screws in the carb (2 hex head types) were loose. So I tightened them
down with a ratchet wrench.

4. Few days later same prob, and some T2 leaking a bit. I bought a torque wrench
yesterday and torqued both carb bolts to the recommended 14 lbs.
I was surprised how much force it took to get to the 14 lb 'click.'

5. I then took a ride and replicated all the situations where it would stall. Also
rode into work this morning (which always failed not far from home) and everything
worked perfectly!

So, bottom line appears that my problem was an air leak below the carb and box
assembly. I will let you know if any of these symptoms return (at which time I
may check the torque on those two carb bolts).

skully93 · Post by **skully93** » Thu Mar 29, 2012 8:50 pm

sheesh!

What a learning experience!

I'm a mechanical n00b, so I try not to meddle, but I do keep watch on these things so that I can pick a bit up in the interim.

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Fri Mar 30, 2012 5:06 pm

I just hope others can learn from my oversites and mistakes!
So many appends ended with "I'll try that and see what happens."
Then it ends, and you never know WHAT fixed the problem !!!
This is why I decided to tell my whole story...hopefully help others
who are in this same situation. There are a LOT of Stella idle problems
in all the forums....problems but not many FINAL fixes.

Bcon · Post by **Bcon** » Wed Apr 11, 2012 1:24 pm

Great that you figured out the problem, very satisfying!

I have two Stellas, they both drizzle 2T oil down the back of the engine. They've both been apart multiple times to try to figure out what's happening (they both run great).

I gave up trying to stop the oil. I'm convinced it's blowing back through the carb and not coming from under the carb box. In fact, it clearly drips from the air screw hole on the back of the carb box when you park.

I've decided that Stellas can just be messy and that's part of the charm (this is a difficult mindset for me, but part of the Zen state that comes with a Stella). I just throw a rag under the engine when I park them in the garage to catch the 2-3 drops of 2T.

lorenajack · Post by **lorenajack** » Tue Apr 17, 2012 8:40 pm

Well, the back of my carb box also has some 2T dripping on occasion. My orig prob was much worse. But like all Stella's there is always something to fix. Yesterday mine lost compression. I am now tearing it apart to see if the piston ring is worn. Always something. Seems whatever I save at the gas pump I make up for in the repair shop!